Nobody can stop Turkish army: FM on Syrian deployment in Afrin

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) - Ankara has no problem with a potential deployment of Syrian regime affiliates in the Kurdish enclave of Afrin as long as the move is not meant to "protect" US-backed Kurdish forces, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Monday.

However, "if the regime is entering [Afrin] to protect the YPG, then nobody can stop the Turkish soldier," Cavusoglu declared during a joint press conference with his Jordanian counterpart Ayman Safadi in Amman, according to Turkish Anadolu Agency.

The YPG is the main US-led coalition ally in the fight against the Islamic State (IS) and the armed force of the self-declared Kurdish-led administration in Syrian Kurdistan, or Rojava, an entity Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has vowed to destroy.

Over the weekend, multiple Kurdish and Syrian sources gave conflicting accounts to the media whether regime forces would be deployed in Afrin, a besieged part of Rojava.

Ankara labels the YPG as "terrorists" for its ties with a decades-long active Kurdish insurgency over self-rule within Turkey, while the Syrian regime has maintained an uneasy truce, despite clashes at times with the group, for much of the civil war.

The move, if implemented, is ostensibly intended to halt the Turkish army and its Islamist proxies staging a now month-long, slowly progressing, incursion into the enclave.

Cavusoglu's remarks signaled an ambiguous Turkish position, undecided to fight on or bring an end to the campaign codenamed "Operation Olive Branch" which has so far killed up to 180 civilians and displaced over 60 thousand.

Turkey has been the primary sponsor of anti-regime Free Syrian Army (FSA) factions, increasingly dominated by al-Qaeda affiliates, and any retreat from its attempted invasion of Afrin could create further discord within rebel ranks.

Turkey had about "100 martyrs," Erdogan said on Sunday, stating that 31 of them were Turkish troops, with the rest belonging to the FSA.

A lukewarm US objection to its NATO ally's operation against its anti-IS partners appeared to have pushed the Afrin Kurds into a deal with the regime, that is supported by Russia, the same government that gave the green light for the attack to Ankara in the first place.

Erdogan also repeatedly threatened to capture the nearby town of Manbij, east of Afrin, where US troops are based since its liberation from IS by YPG-led groups.

Meanwhile, Kurdish activists inside Afrin told Kurdistan 24 that Turkish airstrikes continued on the countryside, namely the district of Ma'batli, where civilian houses were hit.

Editing by Nadia Riva